The introduction to Matthew's Gospel
Matthew's concern was to persuade Jewish people that Jesus was the true Jewish Messiah every Jew was expecting. Matthew did so by connecting Jesus to wherever possible with Jewish tradition. For example, he traced Jesus' genealogy from Abraham (not Adam), quoted often from the Old Testament, exposed the inadequate religious practices of Jewish leaders, demonstrated Jesus' power in miracles, emphasized Jesus' teaching about the true nature of God's kingdom, corrected false ideas centered on an earthly kingdom, and insisted that the gospel is for all nations rather than just for Jews. The book of Matthew forms an ideal connecting link to the Old Testament, oriented as it is to Jewish readers.
Matthew Chapter 1
The Ancestors of Jesus the Messiah
2Abraham was the father of Isaac.
Isaac was the father of Jacob.
Jacob was the father of Judah and his brothers.
3Judah was the father of Perez and Zerah (whose mother was Tamar).
Perez was the father of Hezron.
Hezron was the father of Ram.
4Ram was the father of Amminadab.
Amminadab was the father of Nahshon.
Nahshon was the father of Salmon.
5Salmon was the father of Boaz (whose mother was Rahab).
Boaz was the father of Obed (whose mother was Ruth).
Obed was the father of Jesse.
6Jesse was the father of King David.
David was the father of Solomon (whose mother was Bathsheba, the widow of Uriah).
7Solomon was the father of Rehoboam.
Rehoboam was the father of Abijah.
Abijah was the father of Asa.c
8Asa was the father of Jehoshaphat.
Jehoshaphat was the father of Jehoram.d
Jehoram was the fathere of Uzziah.
9Uzziah was the father of Jotham.
Jotham was the father of Ahaz.
Ahaz was the father of Hezekiah.
10Hezekiah was the father of Manasseh.
Manasseh was the father of Amon.f
Amon was the father of Josiah.
12After the Babylonian exile:
Jehoiachin was the father of Shealtiel.
Shealtiel was the father of Zerubbabel.
13Zerubbabel was the father of Abiud.
Abiud was the father of Eliakim.
Eliakim was the father of Azor.
14Azor was the father of Zadok.
Zadok was the father of Akim.
Akim was the father of Eliud.
15Eliud was the father of Eleazar.
Eleazar was the father of Matthan.
Matthan was the father of Jacob.
16Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary.
Mary gave birth to Jesus, who is called the Messiah.
17All
those listed above include fourteen generations from Abraham to David,
fourteen from David to the Babylonian exile, and fourteen from the
Babylonian exile to the Messiah.
The Birth of Jesus the Messiah
18This
is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be
married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was
still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy
Spirit.
19Joseph, her fiancé, was a good man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagementh quietly.
20As
he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream.
“Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary
as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit.
21And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus,i for he will save his people from their sins.”
23“Look! The virgin will conceive a child!
She will give birth to a son,
and they will call him Immanuel,j
which means ‘God is with us.’”
24When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife.
25But he did not have sexual relations with her until her son was born. And Joseph named him Jesus.
What I get from this passage is that there are a lot of people in Jesus' genealogy that made lots of mistakes! Tamar who had to prostitute herself with her father in law to get a child. David who took another man's wife and had him killed. Ruth who was a Moabite and not from one of the tribes of Israel. At the same time when I think about it this shows me that God is able to use anyone at anytime. When I come back to God like David no matter how bad my mistakes may be He always welcomes me back.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that never crossed my mind until now is the pain that Mary had to go through. Although she was pregnant through the Holy Spirit Joseph tried to call off the engagement. She was probably looked at with a lot of shame from those on the outside because of being pregnant without first being married.